The NORED (Northern Regional Electricity Distributor) Chief Executive Officer, Silvester Wayiti, says the company has to date lost N$4,5 million through copper theft over the years.

Wayiti made the remarks during a stakeholder engagement with the Namibian Broadcasting Cooperation (NBC) management, calling on the national broadcaster to assist in educating the nation about the challenges brought by copper theft, amongst others.  

The engagement forms part of NBC's ongoing stakeholder outreach, aimed at building strategic partnerships with key institutions to better inform, educate and entertain the nation.

Wayiti says the visit is valuable to his company, as they continue to face challenges of copper theft, which results in power outages in various areas of their operations.

"Copper theft: almost every day I receive a notice that there is this village, and there are these town cables stolen. Every wire from a transformer stolen to date we have lost about N$4,5 million in indirect costs. Forget about the impact on society when that happens to a clinic, to so forth, for us running around trying to order the same thing that we could have been expanding, but we have to replace the same thing."

NORED's stakeholder engagement manager, Salmi Mvula, says the meeting was paramount to their institution. 

"I think that is very critical, especially since we are on a journey to renew other areas of the corporation that we are highlighting them in as a means of currency and so on."

NBC Director General Menesia Muinjo reaffirmed the corporation's commitment to working with corporate entities to ensure that information reaches all Namibians through its various platforms.

"When we sit together like this, we can see where we can give and take. Where do we hold hands together and move forward? So we are very happy that there was an MoU that we had. You know it just expired. We have been working together. We must also thank you because you have been supporting us. But we also understand, like the CEO clearly highlighted, that at times you also want to come on board; we need to review the MoU because that helps because under that you can have particular projects."